The Lamp Shop By Chris Fryer

Accept
Taking sips of waking up. Warmth cupped in my hands. The maroon mug my mother gave me on a day when I didn’t want to be me. It was any day. Any year. How I looked at my body, and I said no. How she said yes. Here, have a mug with a woman on it. You need this. This something warm to soothe the worries. Trust me, it’s a beautiful body. Those memories of her are right here, my hands pressing into them, soaking back into the shifting sense of no, of yes, of no, of yes, of no really, I can do this. Self-acceptance. Now, months later, years later, it is this morning, it is any day and every day and daily that both hands hold onto something that holds meaning. A woman given to me by my mother. As in, I accepted the present, which is to say

Ghiorghi
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Flask Dress by Alicia de los Reyes back to top

2014

Winner
The Lamp Shop by Chris Fryer

My wife, she is beautiful, and even in the dark I can feel her frowning when she says, “Do not go today. You should not be working.” I touch the side of her face and she kisses my palm, holding my hand to her cheek. Perhaps I should stay. Already we can hear the bombs of the revolution. I take back my hand and I kiss her lips, but she does not kiss back and she does not say anything when I leave.

The city is drenched in gunpowder. My wife fills the house with the smoke of incense to try and mask the smell, but the smell is everywhere. Everywhere you look, there has been violence there. Overturned, burnt-out vehicles. Everywhere you step, empty bullet casings. A splash of blood. A half-burned rebel pamphlet. The stone walls of the city are scarred by shrapnel, windows shattered by stones, the beauty of the city pulled to the gutter and soaked in kerosene.

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2008

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2007

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